BRISTOL MUSEUM : COLLECTION OF BRITISH LEPIDOPTERA. 225 



by the late Mr. G. W. Braikenridge. This includes twelve 

 specimens of ChriisophanuA dispar, three Nomiades semiargus, 

 and many other rare species. 



Coming down to the present year, a collection of British 

 Lepidoptera of more than common interest has recently been 

 presented to the Museum. In the summer of 1917 there passed 

 from us, full of days, one whose name was formerly well known 

 to students of the Micro-Lepidoptera, Mr. Philip Henry Vaughan, 

 of Kedland Hill House, Bristol, and it is to the liberality of his 

 surviving sister. Miss Lucy A. Vaughan, that the City of Bristol 

 is indebted for this valuable addition to its already large series. 



In the pages of the ' Zoologist,' 1846, Vaughan recorded the 

 finding of a larva of Manduca dtropos beneath an ash tree on 

 Durdham Down, also the capture of two Sphinx convolridi, and 

 from this date notes from his pen appeared frequently in the 

 ' Zoologist ' and the ' Entomologist's Weekly Intelligencer.' In 

 the latter publication, circa 1857, and in the ' Zoologist,' 1858, 

 he described Nepticula pomella, which he discovered near Bristol ; 

 also in the following year he wrote a note on the habits of 

 N. argyropeza, and mentioned, in reply to an editorial remark, 

 that he had bred one specimen of the " Ornix of the beech '' — 

 0. fagivora; this specimen, it may be noted, is still in the 

 collection, 



Mr. A. E, Hudd informs me that the locality " Brs " in that 

 classic of the nineteenth centur}- lepidopterist, ' Stainton's 

 Manual," was furnished from records supplied either by Mr. 

 Vaughan or Mr. Sircom. The latter collected strenuously in 

 the neighbourhood of Brislington, Bristol, from about 1840 to 

 1850, and added several species of " Micros " to the British 

 list, mcXxx^mg Anacampsis sircomella, which was named after him 

 by Stainton. This species, by the way, Vaughan regarded as a 

 variety of A. tc^nioJelLa. 



Sircom's collection was afterwards acquired by Vaughan, and 

 his insects also have thus passed into the possession of the 

 Bristol Museum. As he resided at Brislington, on the southern 

 or Somerset side of the city, whilst Redland, where Vaughan 

 lived, is on the north-west or Gloucestershire side, their locali- 

 ties were, in a .'^ense, complementary to each other, embracing 

 the whole environment of Bfistol. As both these entomologists 

 devoted their j^riiicipal attention to the Micro-Lepidoptera, this 

 section is very largely represented in the collections, and it is 

 easy to see from the condition of the specimens that in the 

 " Micros " their late owner took the greatest interest. It is 

 worthy of note that of the forty-three species of the genus 

 Nepticula dealt with in ' Stainton's Manual,' twenty-nine are 

 credited to the Bristol district, and this large average is in great 

 measure due to the painstaking work of Vaughan and Sircom in 

 breeding these brilliant little atoms. 



